Karen

Web Ideas, Lessons and Status:

My personal website is full of online links for teachers, librarians etc. ...feel free to access it for ideas if it is useful to anyone: [|http://www.teacherlibraryconnection.org] there are alot of links to webcams, podcasting, virutal tours, etc. that i have collected for awhile - I haven't had time to updated it recently but will over the holidays.

As far as what I have used this year with my guys...

This is the first year my students have had a lab (35 imacs) and a teacher librarian. They are a 98% free lunch, breakfast, Hispanic crowd with reading levels that are appalling. But they are bright, beautiful and engaging- I am so in love with my kids -so I am trying to get them on computers as much as possible. I come from a affluent suburbian high school background and have designed graduated classes for librarians online. Haven't done the little guys for years ! and things have changed since then. I am starting from ground zero, but the kids are learning quickly - as am i. As I discover what is too hard - we are backtracking and getting them the skills to bring them up. It's a start although I expected us to be considerably farther by now.

A simple 5th grade project we did- I thought is was simple - I had the kids come up with a list of descriptive words about themselves - they were working on writing. I typed up the list in advance and gave everyone a copy so things would be spelled correctly (an issue with their lists !) and the assignment was to pick 10 they felt best described themselves - type the list in WORD and then cut and paste it into WORDLE.net and play. Oh my..........2 hours later..........we finished and they loved it ! Problems..........they can only hunt and peck - so I have them coming in regularly to do the freebie dance mat typing - great results. They can't cut and paste or toggle between programs.......so we typed directly into wordle.net and are typing into WORD for other projects as practice and will work on cutting and pasting. (not there yet !) Wordle has printing issues with MAC OS and we needed to download and app to help with that. Results - kids wanted to type **more**.......LOVED the program and are excited to do more with it. Successful? hmmm....in some areas yes, in others no. I would do it again for sure...........

ECE is listening to community workers on scholastic website - very cute. []
 * My ECE and Kinder** are on starfall.com and bookflix as often as I can get them on........we are focusing on letters, mouse skills, navigating, etc. They LOVE the computers. Very adaptable and it is easy for them.

reading, bookflix, and navigation. makebeliefscomixs.com they LOVED creating comics - in class they were doing speech bubbles and this is a simple, great way for kids to write dialogue - they couldn't make enough !! It was great ! Read Mo Willems __Don't let the pigeon drive the bus__ to demostrate speech type stories. Showed some graphic novels as demos. Took one session to explore software and play - second time, they worked with an intent to creat a story with beginning, middle and end. They could make 3 or 4 frame comics - Lots of characters to choose from- speech and thought bubbles - colored backgrounds - then they print it out and color it in. They can also write in the speech bubbles or blank them out to handwrite later with spelling help. VERY successful.
 * 1st grade**

**Animal Research Reports**
- First I modeled the entire acitivity then - Each got a grade level book on an animal of their choice - filled in an animal report booklet I created posted below) number one is a 4 page booklet - #2 is a lower level version differentiated for students that cannot handle #1 Read the book - filled in the paperwork with help - got onto online dataabases and researched their animal further. Gave an oral presentation which I am videotaping with a FLIP camera and hoping to post on a wiki. (2nd grade is doing the same but going to blabberize rather than video) 
 * 2nd and 3rd** we are planning on doing poetry magnets online and then using blabberize to record their own poetry. Have some very simple research projects teachers are considering....waiting for some print counterparts to include in projects. Making their own Power point books are in the near future. Going to use comic strips to create a story. The teachers are opening up to research projects for their kids - slow going, but promising.


 * 4th & 5th** are working on dancemat typing to improve their skills, word - just beginning, research is coming but teachers want to wait. Want to try glogster and make belief comix with them asap. There is one 4th grade teacher that is using alot of tech and the kids are rising to the occassion and love it - he has a student teacher that is also an STR and quite tech savvy. Others are not following just yet, but I believe minds are opeing.

I am limited with trying to run the library and the lab and the kids have no skills from home use so we are starting at the very begining across the board and hope to grow from there. The ideas from the conference are great and I need to digest it a bit more to match kids with skills they can be succesful with. I don't want to frustrate them.